The work an unknown good man has done is like a vein of water flowing hidden underground, secretly making the ground green.
Thomas CarlyleRead
Fire is the best of servants, but what a master!
Interpretation
Fire can be incredibly useful when controlled but can be devastating when it is not.
This quote by Thomas Carlyle underscores the dual nature of fire as both a tool and a potential threat. It highlights the importance of understanding and respecting powerful forcesβwhether they are literal like fire or metaphorical like passion or ambition. When used wisely, fire serves as a helpful servant, but when allowed to dominate, it becomes a destructive master.
In practice
In a speech about innovation, one might say, 'Remember, fire is the best of servants, but what a master!' when discussing the responsible use of technology.
The work an unknown good man has done is like a vein of water flowing hidden underground, secretly making the ground green.
Thirty millions, mostly fools.
There is a great discovery still to be made in literature, that of paying literary men by the quantity they do not write.
For the superior morality, of which we hear so much, we too would desire to be thankful: at the same time, it were but blindness to deny that this superior morality is properly rather an inferior criminality, produced not by greater love of Virtue, but by greater perfection of Police; and of that far subtler and stronger Police, called Public Opinion.
Enjoying things which are pleasant; that is not the evil; it is the reducing of our moral self to slavery by them that is.
Clean undeniable right, clear undeniable might: either of these once ascertained puts an end to battle. All battle is a confused experiment to ascertain one and both of these.
Don't feed the trolls; nothing fuels them so much.
The hard and stiff will be broken. _x000D_ The soft and supple will prevail.
The future is carved out of the present moment. Tomorrow's harvest depends upon today's ploughing and sowing.
In all affairs it's a healthy thing now and then to hang a question mark on the things you have long taken for granted.
...I have always maintained that, excepting fools, men did not differ much in intellect, only in zeal and hard work; and I still think there is an eminently important difference.
We accumulate our opinions at an age when our understanding is at its weakest.
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